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PCC Probates and Administrations
(1645)The Prerogative Court of Canterbury's main jurisdiction was central and southern England and Wales, as well as over sailors &c dying abroad: these brief abstracts, compiled under the title "Year Books of Probates", and printed in 1906, usually give address, date of probate and name of executor or administrator. They are based on the Probate Act Books, cross-checked with the original wills, from which additional details are, occasionally, added. The original spelling of surnames was retained, but christian and place names have been modernised where necessary.

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Well-Affected Men of Kent
(1648)After the capture of king Charles I by the forces of Parliament, this petition signed by over 1100 of 'the well affected in the county of Kent' was drawn up, calling on the Commons to prosecute his trial vigorously, and not to be satisfied with 'less than the blood of those persons, who have been the principall Authors' of the civil war; and also to transfer authority over all the militia in the country to 'his Excellency the Lord Fairfax'. Thomas Hearne the antiquary published a copy of the petition 'taken by no very skillfull scribe' in 1774, observing that such petitions were 'very diligently drawn up, not by the honest part, but by the very scum, of the Nation, signed generally by persons, in all respects, of an ordinary Reputation.' In this particular case, he noted, 'you'll scarce find one among them of any note or distinction.'

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Inhabitants of Reading in Berkshire
(1550-1667)The borough of Reading in Berkshire comprised three ancient parishes - St Giles, St Lawrence and St Mary. The churchwardens' accounts of Reading St Mary from 1550 to 1667 were transcribed by Francis N. A. Garry and A. G. Garry and published in 1893. The accounts, usually signed off by the two churchwardens and two surveyors of the highways for the year, listed the income and expenditure of the church. Income included annual payments for seats in the pews; rents from church property; fees for the use of the pall and for tolling the knell (knill) at funerals, and for opening graves; and sums received for 'gatherings', i. e. money gathered from communicants at Easter, Hocktide, Mayday, Hallowmas, Christmas and Whit. Expenditure was largely on maintaining the church fabric, and paying the minor officials - most of the names found on this side of the account are of local workmen busy with repairs.

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Licences for marriages in southern England
(1632-1714)The province or archbishopric of Canterbury covered all England and Wales except for the northern counties in the four dioceses of the archbishopric of York (York, Durham, Chester and Carlisle). Marriage licences were generally issued by the local dioceses, but above them was the jurisdiction of the archbishop. Where the prospective bride and groom were from different dioceses it would be expected that they obtain a licence from the archbishop; in practice, the archbishop residing at Lambeth, and the actual offices of the province being in London, which was itself split into myriad ecclesiastical jurisdictions, and spilled into adjoining dioceses, this facility was particularly resorted to by couples from London and the home counties, although there are quite a few entries referring to parties from further afield. Three calendars of licences issued by the Faculty Office of the archbishop were edited by George A Cokayne (Clarenceux King of Arms) and Edward Alexander Fry and printed as part of the Index Library by the British Record Society Ltd in 1905. The first calendar is from 14 October 1632 to 31 October 1695 (pp. 1 to 132); the second calendar (awkwardly called Calendar No. 1) runs from November 1695 to December 1706 (132-225); the third (Calendar No. 2) from January 1707 to December 1721, but was transcribed only to the death of queen Anne, 1 August 1714. The calendars give only the dates and the full names of both parties. Where the corresponding marriage allegations had been printed in abstract by colonel Joseph Lemuel Chester in volume xxiv of the Harleian Society (1886), an asterisk is put by the entry in this publication. The licences indicated an intention to marry, but not all licences resulted in a wedding.

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City of London: Mercers
(1724)A list of the members of the several London livery companies that polled for Edward Bellamy esquire to be sheriff for the city of London and county of Middlesex for the remaining part of the year, published 16 March 1724. Full names are given, surname first, arranged roughly alphabetically by company.

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Insolvents
(1840)Insolvency notices for England and Wales: insolvency often caused people to restart their lives elsewhere, so these are an important source for lost links

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Merchant Seamen
(1835-1844)At this period, the foreign trade of ships plying to and from the British isles involved about 150,000 men on 15,000 ships; and the coasting trade about a quarter as many more. A large proportion of the seamen on these ships were British subjects, and so liable to be pressed for service in the Royal Navy; but there was no general register by which to identify them, so in 1835 parliament passed a Merchant Seamen's Registration Bill. Under this act a large register of British seamen was compiled, based on ships' crew lists gathered in British and Irish ports, and passed up to the registry in London. A parliamentary committee decided that the system devised did not answer the original problem, and the original register was abandoned after less than two years: the system was then restarted in this form, with a systematic attempt to attribute the seamen's (ticket) numbers, and to record successive voyages. The register records the number assigned to each man; his name; age; birthplace; quality (S = seaman, &c.); and the name and official number of his ship, with the date of the crew list (usually at the end of a voyage). Most of the men recorded were born in the British Isles, but not all. The system was still very cumbersome, because the names were amassed merely under the first two letters of surname; an attempt was made to separate out namesakes by giving the first instance of a name (a), the second (b), and so on. In this volume the register is restarted from 1840 onwards, with the mariner's previous number (if any) being entered in the column after his birthplace. In the event of it becoming known that a man had died during the course of a voyage, that information is written across the remaining empty columns. This volume (BT 112/10) covers mariners whose surnames start with Bu and By (and McBu and McBy).

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Long-stay Paupers in Workhouses: Maidstone
(1861)This comprehensive return by the Poor Law Board for England and Wales in July 1861 revealed that of the 67,800 paupers aged 16 or over, exclusive of vagrants, then in the Board's workhouses, 14,216 (6,569 men, 7,647 women) had been inmates for a continuous period of five years and upwards. The return lists all these long-stay inmates from each of the 626 workhouses that had been existence for five years and more, giving full name; the amount of time that each had been in the workhouse (years and months); the reason assigned why the pauper in each case was unable to sustain himself or herself; and whether or not the pauper had been brought up in a district or workhouse school (very few had). The commonest reasons given for this long stay in the workhouse were: old age and infirm (3,331); infirm (2,565); idiot (1,565); weak mind (1,026); imbecile (997); and illness (493).

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Royal Horse Guards fighting in Egypt
(1882)The war medal roll for the Egyptian campaign of 1882 is annotated to show those men actually present at Tel-el-Kebir, and thereby also entitled to the Tel-el-Kebir clasp. In addition, there follows an almost duplicate roll of men entitled to the Bronze Star granted by the Khedive of Egypt in recognition of the campaign. Royal Horse Guards were present at the actions at Kassasin and at the battle of Tel-el-Kebir. This roll was compiled back at Regents Park Barracks in March 1883.

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Royal Irish Dragoon Guards fighting in Egypt
(1882)The war medal roll for the Egyptian campaign of 1882 is annotated to show those men actually present at Tel-el-Kebir, and thereby also entitled to the Tel-el-Kebir clasp. In addition, there follows an almost duplicate roll of men entitled to the Bronze Star granted by the Khedive of Egypt in recognition of the campaign. The 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards embarked for Egypt in 1882, taking part in the battle of Tel-el-Kebir, and returned to England before the end of the year. This medal roll was compiled at Brighton in November 1882: the medals were issued the following January.